The Crusaders Reach Jerusalem (from a set of Scenes from Gerusalemme Liberata)

Domenico Paradisi

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

Commissioned by Cardinal Pietro Ottoboni, a great-nephew of Pope Alexander VIII, this was part of a massive series, heroic in scale as well as narrative, of fifteen tapestries depicting the romanticized version of the Christians’ First Crusade into Jerusalem recounted in Tasso’s sixteenth-century epic poem, Gerusalemme Liberata (Jerusalem Delivered). As the crusaders reach the city of Jerusalem, two of the Christian leaders kneel in the foreground, both in Classical armor with garments of red, blue and yellow. The younger man is presumably Godfrey of Bouillon. Other mounted men in gray armor are seen behind. Rising in the background on the right are the walls of Jerusalem.

European Sculpture and Decorative Arts

An exhibit at Metropolitan Museum of Art

The fifty thousand objects in the Museum's comprehensive and historically important collection of European sculpture and decorative arts reflect the development of a number of art forms in Western European countries from the early fifteenth through the early twentieth century. The holdings include sculpture in many sizes and media, woodwork and furniture, ceramics and glass, metalwork and jewelry, horological and mathematical instruments, and tapestries and textiles. Ceramics made in Asia for export to European markets and sculpture and decorative arts produced in Latin America during this period are also included among these works.

Metropolitan Museum of Art